Slashdot Mirror
The Text Message Typo That Landed a Man In Jail
Barence writes "A British man was jailed for 18 months for accidentally sending an explicit text message to his entire address book. 24-year-old swimming coach Craig Evans intended to send a text message to his girlfriend asking her for sex. Instead, the message was accidentally sent to his entire BlackBerry address book, including two girls, aged 13 and 14, from his swimming class. He was subsequently arrested and charged with 'causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity,' and – incredibly – jailed for 18 months at Birmingham Crown Court in July. Yesterday, an appeal's court freed Evans, although he wasn't cleared — the sentence was merely reduced to a nine-month suspended jail term."
that it must have been a jury made up of 12 Daily Mail readers.
I can't even figure out how to send a message to all my Blackberry contacts...
How does one make a mistake like that?
Sounds a little like the ProjetX we had here in Holland. A girl accidentally asked the whole FB community to join her on her birthday-party. She forgot to mention that it was for her friends and family only.
Thousands gathered in a small village (pop. 20.000), rioted, plundered stores, burned cars, damage ~ 1 million total.
A quick search on "projectX Haren" should suffice for more info.
On the guy... that is well inconvenient mate!
rm -rf --no-preserve-root /
Only source for this appears to be the Daily Mail, not a publication noted for its accurate reporting. How easy is it to accidentally send a text message to an entire contact list on Blackberries? I've never used a phone that made such a thing possible.
How do you even send a text message to your entire address book? This sounds more like the guy used some very poor judgement, but I doubt it was accidental.
He's the swim coach. That's fairly common, for quick updates about practices and meets.
Yeah clearly if you know how to contact someone underage you're a pedophile.
Now let the government go through all your contact lists.
Because he was a swimming coach. He probably had their cell and their parents too. To notify them things like when and where they should have their swim meet.
Unlike say 20 years ago. It is common for a family to have more then 1 phone. And the kid is more resposnible for their information.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Kids of a friend? Friends of a kid? Nephew/Niece? He needed to give them a ride somewhere once, he's an emergency contact for them, or maybe they friended him on Facebook because he's a buddy of their dad's and around the house a lot, and included their numbers in their profile?
There's a decent number of reasons that a 30-something normal adult would have the numbers of a few children in their address book. If there were like... 20 children that would start to get weird, but two seems pretty normal especially if there's some logical connection.
the consequences will never be the same.
he done goofed. got backtraced.
i agree... fucking mormons...
So this is why the stock was up 20% pre-market:
http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/rimm
(No it's not.)
You can send a broadcast message to all contacts in a folder or to individual contacts. Recipients cannot reply to broadcast messages.
On the Contact list screen, press the Menu key.
Click Broadcast Message.
Complete the Announcement field.
If you have administrator permissions and want to send the broadcast message to all of the users on the server, select the System message check box. Click OK.
Click Recipients.
Click a folder.
Perform one of the following actions:
To send the broadcast message to all of the contacts in the folder, select the Select All check box.
To send the broadcast message to individual contacts in the folder, select the check box beside the contacts.
Click OK.
Click OK.
That seems hard to do by accident, but at least slightly possible.
refactor the law, its bloated, confusing and unmaintainable.
Maybe it's because he was their swimming instructor, and gave them a ride somewhere or something? It's not like he had dozens of minors' contacts lying around and a string of lewd messages to them in his contact history (believe me, the police will have checked with the phone company by now).
Christ, panic mongers like yourself are the reason children are increasingly living in padded isolation boxes to protect them from big scary reality, and men are terrified to so much as speak to a child lest they be accused of molesting them. It's at the point now where, out of self-preservation, I would drive right by a child alone on the side of the road in the middle of winter. I would not stop to help. Why? Because if god forbid something happened to them later, or they decided to say something about me, the world would ruin my life for the greater good.
Ask yourself if that's really the best thing for children. For every pedophile you've cowed into hiding (they don't go away mind you, and when they think nobody is looking they're still going to do horrible things) you scare away hundreds or thousands of decent human beings who would help a child in need. Your child is far more likely to be hurt by tripping and falling, getting lost, or eating something dangerous; and if you're not around, you'd best hope there's a woman nearby to help because with this attitude the men will stay the fuck away.
>>> If I kill you by accident, that is alright then?
No, but I don't expect you will get charged with premeditated murder. Intention matters.
Obviously (at least if the Daily Mail is to be believed, and I do have some doubts about this), the guy does not belong in jail, nor does he belong on the sex offenders list. The worst that should have happened to him was that he had to apologize to everyone he sent this message to, nothing more, nothing less.
Negligent? Maybe, but to err is human. All too often these days a simple mistake (whether it be sending the message or buying a Blackberry in the first place) is twisted into something that it simply is not: a crime.
And on the Eighth Day, Man created God.
Lawyers are always going on about "intent". So, where are they in this case? Oh wait no "intent" is just another tool used to put you in jail, not to help you get out.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
13 - 14 years transport themselves, at least where I live. They use either buses or bicycle.
>No, they go to the parents who transport their children to the meetings. So I'll ask again; Why did he have the phone numbers of 13 and 14 year olds on his phone?
Because they were 13 and 14 year old's NOT 6 and 7 year olds. That means they were high-school aged. Now I know in America you treat highschool teenagers that age as if they were babies but in the rest of the world they are allowed and indeed EXPECTED to take a modicum of responsibility for their own actions.
Including almost CERTAINLY having to get to practise THEMSELVES using available public transport, bycicles and the like.
My parents would have found the idea of "taking a high school kid to a sports practise" stupid beyond measure. They bought me a bike instead.
Even aside from that - there IS such a thing as non-sexual friendships between adults and teenagers. Teens seeking advice, role models and the like - and adults who are willing to play that role, often ones in positions like coaches, guidance councillors and such who are able and willing to give good advice to difficult questions that those kids may not be as comfortable discussing with their parents.
That's not just innocent, it's a NORMAL part of growing up and depriving kids of that thinking you're protecting them is a very good way to make them less likely to grow up into responsible adults.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
"No, they go to the parents who transport their children to the meetings."
Kids use public transports outside the US, we're not backwards morons.
Second, he did send a sexual text to underaged children. That it was by accident makes it alright?
Mens rea is sort of a thing in common law jurisdictions... It isn't an absolute/binary matter; but it has long been the case that both act and intent are what make the crime. This is why, for instance, 'negligent homicide' is different than '1st degree murder'. If you were to kill me by accident it obviously wouldn't be 'alright', I'd still be pretty dead, and depending on the circumstances you might be on the civil and/or criminal hook for some sort of negligence, recklessness, or indifference; but, yeah, you certainly wouldn't be going down on Murder 1 charges...
Having, thankfully, not dealt with a Blackberry user interface in a while, I have no idea where on the continuum from 'freak accident, could have happened to anyone' to 'epic negligence' sending a given message to your entire address book is; but none of those places are the same as intentionally sending the message to the legally problematic recipients.
These aren't kids. They are teenagers. You know, the age group where they are expected to be mature enough to look after their own life a little bit.
Help I am stuck in a signature factory!
A woman at work was having an affair with a man in the office. She wanted to send him a sexy picture via email, she accidentally sent it to the 4th floor distribution list.
She was gone so fast that I didn't even see her after the email, and she came back to get her things after hours.
"Second, he did send a sexual text to underaged children. That it was by accident makes it alright?"
I hope the next time you say 'fuck you', a kid is standing right behind you.
Then at least we won't have to read your crap for some time.
This. Even as an American I had contact with my several of my teachers outside of school. They were role models and sources of advice when I was in school, and friends now that I am an adult. Heck, last time I was in town I had a beer with my old art teacher and we bitched about clients together.
>If I kill you by accident, that is alright then?
Maybe. You won't be charged with murder. You MAY be charged with manslaughter. The legal test for manslaughter is: 'caused a death where a reasonable person would not'.
So if reasonable precautions on your part would have prevented the death - and you didn't take them - then you're guilty, otherwise you are indeed innocent.
To make up a random example. You're a forklift driver. Your forklift runs downhil while you stop for lunch, runs over a car and kills the driver. Are you guilty ? Well if you had left the handbrake off - then you are. If you had pulled it up but the brake FAILED while you were gone, then you're innocent.
See how it works ?
So we can apply a similar test to this accident if it helps you feel better.
We know (and an appeals court judge has declared) based on the available evidence that there was no intent here. But was the accident excusable ? Well it depends - was it an accident a reasonable person would have been able to avoid ?
For that one would have to look at the interface of the specific phone, the methods that led to this happening and the particular circumstances of the case. You cannot just universally make a declaration about it. There is even the possibility that this was caused by an obscure or sporadic bug in that version of the blackberry OS - that even RIM may not know about yet and NO action of his would have prevented it. Such bugs can and do happen - this site is full of programmer's we've all seen bugs like that. If that is the case (and we - and likely HE doesn't know that) then he would be completely innocent by the "reasonable person" measure.
I sincerely doubt the Jury ever really tried to question how reasonable his actions were since they never even asked the intent question despite the strong evidence showing there wasn't any.
Now the fact is that this question quite academic - the question of whether he had acted in a reasonable manner hasn't been answered and we don't have enough information to answer it. The appeals judge may have, and may have decided on those grounds that he did NOT take reasonable precautions to keep his sexual message away from the minors and this is why he remains guilty - but the judge DID agree the actions were without INTENT and this is why his sentence was so significantly mitigated.
But that is just a guess - I haven't read the actual court reports so don't take this as a claim of fact, just a likely explanation of the outcome.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Try hebephile for pubescent, ephebophile for the slightly older.
Sigs are so 1990s. No way would I be seen dead with one.
See a poster above - outside the USA it's very normal for children of all ages to transport themselves to places. I was catching a bus home from school by the time I was 9.
If this guy was their swimming coach, then he had a perfectly justifiable reason for having their numbers in his phone, even if it was just so he knew which one of his team was texting him to say that she couldn't come to a training session.
Yes, he screwed up. But it doesn't justify the offence he was convicted of, which will place him on the offenders register for a minimum of 10 years, and has therefore completely destroyed his chosen career.
The ruination of a man's life is a hard price to pay for a social faux-pas.
This isn't a Blackberry issue, this is an issue about a slip of the finger, I think Jail was a little extreme. He didn't ask these girls for sex on purpose. Plus I'm sure he said more then just "lets have sex', there was probably some indication that it was meant for a certain person and not everyone.
Forget it, the Two Minute Hate has begun.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Jury justice is a silly form of justice anyway. Suspects should at least get the chance of a fair trial. There is no chance of that with the jury system. The person who invented the jury system was a probably a moron who liked lynchparties.
And on the Eighth Day, Man created God.
Chances are that that kid knows more about sex than any of us will ever forget.
And on the Eighth Day, Man created God.
The way I see it you're actually making life more dangerous for children.
I pose this question to males out there: You're driving down the road and see a young child, maybe 12 years old, on the side of the road. It's cold, too cold to be safely outside, and they're trying to wave you down. You don't recognize them, but they're obviously distressed. Would you stop to help?
I, for one, would not. If it's some attention-seeking disturbed child, or just the child of some overzealous protective parents, I could wind up in jail with my life ruined for my efforts. Safer thing to do for me is pretend I never saw anything, and hope someone finds them. I'd even be nervous to call 911, because then it's "Why didn't you stop to help?" which makes me suspicious. Good luck kid, blame your parents' attitudes.
Phone number of parents is great, as they are responsible for their child (as they are still children by law). They will take the children to meets, pick them up etc. There is no need to have the child's phone number at all.
What a sick little twisted mind you've got. So according to you, I shouldn't have the phone numbers of my grandchildren? I'll conclude that you think that you couldn't be trusted with a child's phone number.
Wow, you would be absolutely terrified to find out that I have my both stepson's girlfriends on Facebook, Google Talk AND in my mobile phone contacts.
What you are doing is applying a paradigm from decades ago topped by an unhealthy amount of fear to the modern world.
30 years ago, you are correct, a parent would have had the telephone numbers of the other parents in the kid's social group, because 30 years ago, the kids didn't have their own phone. No both my stepsons, for all the fact they are nice kids, are absolute dildos when it comes to remembering basic administration like keeping their phones charged. It's happened enough that rather than have to rely on smoke signals and hope, I and my wife now have the phone numbers of the people they are most likely to be around so we can get in touch if we have to.
Besides that, both of the girls are really nice kids. Personally, I'm glad I got the opportunity to see them grow up a bit as well.
I have to agree with some of the posts above - it is entirely possible - common even, since I think it's safe to say that pedophiles are a minority - for an adult male to have a non-creepy, platonic and non-romantic relationship with minors. It's called friendship.
A.I. Research. The peculiar science in which we know the question and we know the answer, but can't show the working
Yes, he was an idiot. But the offence he was convicted of will place him on the Sex Offenders Register for a minimum of 10 years ; he can basically kiss goodbye to his job, or any job working with minors. He probably won't even be allowed back into a swimming pool, as an "area frequented by children".
His life has been ruined by a social faux-pas.
People like that just don't want to look at the facts. The facts are that the vast majority of pedophiles know the victim by being a family member or a friend of the family aunt or uncle). And while men are slightly more often found to be doing this sort of thing 1/3rd of pedophiles are actually women most are never convicted though and boys are far less likely to come forward if I woman makes a sexual advance).
Yet men and more so 'strange' men who are not family friends or relatives are the targets of the publics outrage over these things. It just goes to prove how irrational most people are and how sensationalist most of the media is.
we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
Stupid liberal bitch newscaster
Whether the newscaster was wrong or not, that was uncalled for.
Also, Mitt Romney needs to learn how to properly tell a joke - might I suggest he sit down with Mike Huckabee or Arlen Specter?
I am officially gone from
As far as teaching kids responsibility, one of my favorites from my sister's swim team coach:
Kid: "My mom forgot to pack a bathing suit."
Coach: "Is your mom on the swim team?"
I am officially gone from
But that's how they reproduce!
I've been in a situation just as you describe.
A month or so ago my neighbor's daughter knocked on my door. It was raining and cold and she had been locked out of her house. I have a daughter who does not live with me full time, so I let the neighbor girl in and sent her to my daughter's room to change into dry clothes and hang out until her mom to got home.
An hour or so later her mom arrives home and was very grateful... until she learned that my daughter wasn't living with me that week. My thanks? She called the police. I wasn't arrested or charged with anything, but an officer did arrive to take statements.
Next time her kid gets locked out, she can catch pneumonia.
Only if your mind is in a certain gutter. The rest of us think that this is *normal*.
>
The ruination of a man's life is a hard price to pay for a technical faux-pas.
If there was no intention to cause harm and there was no actual harm done then there should be no penalty or a symbolic slap on the wrist.
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
I'm the father of a 13-year-old girl, and I have several of her friends' numbers in my phone. Why? Here's a few reasons:
While my daughter has her own phone, she often forgets it or forgets to charge it. Also, she's often on restriction at her Mom's house and not allowed to have a phone there, and when she is, she simply leaves it at my house. (I have her every other week.) Thus, her friends often call me looking for her. I don't have a good memory for phone numbers, so I've saved the numbers of those who call looking for her often, along with their names, so the caller ID on my phone will show me the name instead of the number. That way, I can often answer with a simple, "Hi. She's not here, she's at her mom's" or simply hand the phone over to her to answer.
Secondly, and relating to number one, sometimes she needs to call her friends, and doesn't have her phone. Having their numbers in my phone allows me to hand it over to her and let her call them, without having to go through the hoops of calling their parents. (Some of whom are divorced, and thus it can be a guessing game as to which parent one needs to call to reach the child.)
(And parenthetically here, that's part of what led me to start saving the kids' numbers in the first place. After having done the game of "Oh, you need to talk to Jenny? Okay, I'll call her mom... hi, Angie, Margie needs to talk to Jenny... oh, she's with Mark? Okay, I don't have Mark's number, can you give it to me? Thanks. Hi, Mark, this is Margie's dad. Margie Andrews. She's a friend of Jenny, and she wants to ask her about... oh, she's over at Alicia's? Do you have the number there? No? Oh, Alicia has a phone? Okay, let me write that down...." two or three times a month for several months, I found it was much easier when she wanted to contact one of the other kids to just have her call that kid directly.)
Third, when she's out with friends and has forgotten her own phone (or it's out of charge), it makes it easy for me to call and get her, since I know who she's with. Even if they've gone out walking, or have walked over to another friend's house in the neighborhood, I can still get her, since I have the numbers of people she's actually physically with.
Now, I don't go around asking for these kids' phone numbers -- I just tag them with their names after they've called me, or save them after I've been given their number and had to call them. (I'd hope by now that in a world of Caller ID, all parents are teaching their children that if you don't want someone to have your number, you shouldn't call them directly.)
I also have the phone numbers of a few older teens who are in my weekly D&D group that meets at a gaming store. I'm the GM, so people have given me their numbers so I can let them know if I'm not going to be able to make it for some reason, or if I'm going to be late, or for similar things. Some of their parents I know; some of them I don't, since these are high school kids who have their own cars and get around on their own. I'd actually prefer to use email for that, since I usually know well in advance, but one of them especially checks her email very rarely, but always gets texts -- and, of course, sometimes I don't know I'm going to be running late until only an hour or so before the game, and many people don't check their email that often. (Usually in that case I actually just text two of the people, and ask them to text everyone else... but one of those is the girl who's the social hub of the teen group.)
I'd not even call this a social faux-pas. It would be that if he had texted a coworker his wish for her to please him sexually, NOT KNOWING that such a behaviour was inappropriate.
This guy merely clicked a wrong button. I mean, hell, has the judge never hit the wrong button in an elevator? Never dialed the wrong number?
British juries are about as intelligent as American juries, however British judges are not political appointments and so don't have to grandstand to keep their jobs.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Next time her kid gets locked out, she can catch pneumonia.
Piss off the little girl and you could be even more fucked now that her mom has shown her what's possible.
Are you sure about that? Sentencing someone to 18 months in prison for a mistakenly sent text?
I think I would temper the condescending tone a bit. The reason why kids get driven to events in the US is largely because they are far away and too close together to school or other obligations to make it on public transportation and/or a bike in time. There is also the problem of early sunsets in the winter time (when school is in session) where a lot of sports events are held after dark making riding a bike a bit dangerous. We also aren't crammed into boxes living assholes to elbows from each other like a lot of people are in Europe..
Besides, this is all pointless because the coach probably asked for a contact number and the kids gave him their cell numbers instead of the home phone or their parent's cell number. At least with the kid's number, they didn't have to worry about if Dad or Mom was taking them or if they were riding with someone else or whatever could happen when you can't contact someone directly.
IANAL, but: intent may be irrelevant in this case. The current fashion is to make so-called "strict liability" laws, especially in the area of "child protection". For example, in the UK, if there are child-porn pictures on your computer, then you are guily of an offence, regardless of how they got there. I don't know, but the same may apply in this case.
The beauty of this is that it allows the police to arrest people like this unfortunate person and put them in jail without all the tedious arguments about whether they intended do harm or whether it was an accident. A jury will be told "if he sent the message then he is guilty, even if it was a mistake".
Indeed, it is even possible for a policeman to force someone to do something against their will, and then arrest them for it. Google the case of "Winzar (1983)" if you don't believe me.
Pedophilia is a sexual preference for prepubescent children. Sexual preference for young adolescents is hebephilia.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/contents
The relevant section is http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/42/section/10
"Causing or inciting a child to engage in sexual activity
(1)A person aged 18 or over (A) commits an offence if—
(a)he intentionally causes or incites another person (B) to engage in an activity,
(b)the activity is sexual, and
(c)either—
(i)B is under 16 and A does not reasonably believe that B is 16 or over, or
(ii)B is under 13.
(2)A person guilty of an offence under this section, if the activity caused or incited involved—
(a)penetration of B’s anus or vagina,
(b)penetration of B’s mouth with a person’s penis,
(c)penetration of a person’s anus or vagina with a part of B’s body or by B with anything else, or
(d)penetration of a person’s mouth with B’s penis,is liable, on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 14 years.
(3)Unless subsection (2) applies, a person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—
(a)on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 6 months or to a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum or both;
(b)on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 14 years."
"would you fuck me" - is clearly inciting penetration, so you can do up to 14 years for this.
This is _NOT_ a strict liability offence.
The jury must have had reason to believe that he intended to do this.
Doing it by accident _CANNOT_ lead to a conviction, unless the judge misdirects them.
For example - if he'd directed that because he intended to send it to one person on the list, that intent carried over to the unintended recipients.
Indeed, I can't seem to see any 'strict liability' offences in the act.
I may have missed some.
At a minimum you need to have intended the action and not known the other party was underage.
Really, if you are in a sexual relationship, you could at least have the courtesy to ask for sex in person. SMS has all the warmth of a late postcard.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
My kid is on a hockey team.
All the parents and coaches have the contact info of all the parents, AND all the kids who have phones.
Because sometimes other parents take kids to games/practices.
This is on an 11/12 yr old team.
This is normal.
As for your point why those two? Probably because all the others on the team were 16. These two kids were 'swimming up' ie the best at their age, so they compete against the older kids. Same on my kid's hockey team. There's one 10 yr old. We have his phone number too.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
If I'm driving down a 2-lane highway and have a catastrophic failure in a tire that causes my car to spin out, cross the center line, hit your car killing you... is that really my fault? What if it was a piece of debris in the road that caused the tire to fail?
No you would get off with that. If at the same time a notebook on your passenger seat with an intimate letter to your wife flew out of the window and landed on my teenage daughter's lap then you'd end up doing time.
Ah, don't let her mother's illness hurt her child.
If it happens again, when she shows up, call the police to explain that she's there, and you're caring for her until her mother returns. You're on record, and hey - there's a chance that the child will remember it, and grow up without inheriting her mother's sexual psychosis.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Next time the kid gets locked out call the cops about a neglected child locked out of her home.
I'm the father of a 13-year-old girl, and I have several of her friends' numbers in my phone. Why? Here's a few reasons:
Thanks for taking the time to post an explanation, but throughout reading it all I could think of is:
It is precisely no one's business but your own.
The sexual-psychosis-fueled witch hunt has reached new levels when people feel they need to justify the presence of phone numbers in their contact list. Have the Western taliban really made this much progress towards paranoid dystopia?
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
This isn't hypothetical. I remember a news article a few years back (can't find it online, so my memory here might be slightly off) about a little girl who drowned in a river or lake near a road in the UK. The girl had wandered off from the parent's cottage or something. A man had been driving by and thought it unsafe that the child was alone in the field, so close to water.
He drove on without reporting it right away (might not have had a cell phone). After the story broke that the girl had drowned he came forward and said he didn't stop precisely because he feared his life could be ruined by a hysterical accusation of child abduction or molestation.
After this admission, public opinion basically ripped him apart for not stopping to prevent a tragic death.
Basically, the only thing he did differently from what you'd do, is that he didn't keep quiet after learning of the drowning. He may have been a decent human being and felt guilty about not helping, but being a decent human would've screwed him over regardless.
The point is that it offers him plausible deniability as a fishing expedition - send it out and if one of the teen girls replies then he's got what he wanted
And do to that you would send a request for sex to your mom, your DAD, all your co-workers, your banker, your accountant, your SISTER, etc???
That is the dumbest theory I have ever heard. It's like "fishing" with an atom bomb, where not even the water or your own boat are left at the end of the process.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
As an IT person I see stupid mistakes all the time, we are people, it happens, no biggie. So to jail someone for what anyone could do by accident is unconscionable.
(If at first you don't succeed, do it different next time!)
true story,
young teenage girl standing at the corner going to cross the street with headphones on.
she steps off the curb, and would have been killed.
well-meaning 30-something guy pulls her back from the road a fraction of a second before she gets killed.
girl is grateful, what does the guy get for his good deed?
he was charged with sexual assault, put in jail, and is now marked for the rest of his life as a sex offender.
so as hard as it would be, if I ever was in a situation like that, I'm sorry, you're kid is dead...
I would bet if he had accidentally killed those two girls with his car, he would have gotten less jail time.
It is a bet you might very well lose:
Sentencing
A person convicted of causing death by dangerous driving is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years. Disqualification for a minimum of two years is obligatory on conviction. Endorsement is obligatory on conviction. The offense carries three to eleven penalty points (when the defendant is exceptionally not disqualified).
The Court of Appeal in R v Cooksley and others gave guidelines for cases where death is caused by dangerous driving. In R v Richardson the Court of Appeal reassessed the starting point set out in R v Cooksley taking into consideration the increase in the maximum penalty. The relevant starting points identified in Cooksley should be reassessed as follows:
i) No aggravating circumstances --- twelve months to two years' imprisonment (previously 18 months);
ii) Intermediate culpability --- two to four and a half years' imprisonment (previously 3 years);
iii) Higher culpability --- four and a half to seven years' imprisonment (previously 5 years);
iv) Most serious culpability --- seven to fourteen years' imprisonment (previous starting point of 6 years).
Causing death by dangerous driving
That it was by accident makes it alright?
Are you serious? Yeah, I'm sure that text scarred them for life. They're as good as dead!
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Well, he's lucky he wasn't in the US. Even after he got out, we would have put his name and picture on a public registry, made him stay a hundred yards away from all schools and playgrounds, and monitored his movement with GPS... AFTER he got out of prison.
I did google - ended up here. This is scary beyond belief. I don't even know how that can be called justice. I know that is not at the same scale but that certainly put our outrage against some aspect of justice in other countries in perspective.
Dude if you think Coulter isn't batshit you should watch that debate on YouTube with her against Al Franken, where he takes a page from her book he said he picked at random while waiting for his wife to put on her makeup and shows how badly she warps everything she says to fit her agenda. The passage he picked was a dem trying to make a "modest proposal" of how we could solve all the airport problems if we were just all nekkid, no need for the TSA to grab your junk if its right there after all.
A sane person, especially one as supposedly educated as Coulter is supposed to be, would know what "A Modest Proposal" meant and that anything said in that vein was strictly satire to point out the insanity of a situation, yet Coulter attacked like a rabid pit bull how the left was "gonna make an attack on the believers by making them get nekkid" or some shit. Even the audience was laughing at the way the crazy woman was trying to make flaming hoops to jump through to try to defend herself over her book, and that's just sad. She ended up just trying to shout down Franken every time he tried to speak, even though he quietly let her ramble all she wanted, because she knew if he opened his mouth she'd look like an idiot again. just sad.
And Palin? Let me ask you just ONE question...would you trust Caribou Barbie to have her hand on the button? I sure as hell wouldn't. Not her, not Cain, not Bachmann, and sure as hell not Trump. Finally as for Paul? He's NOT sane, he just has a few sane ideas, such as auditing the fed. You read his platform and it would pretty much end up an Ayn Rand version of paradise, which would be hell for anyone who isn't a 1%er. Hell even HE was shocked at how quickly the Randites in his own party screamed "LET HIM DIE!" when he asked what should happen to the young man who is hurt and needs an operation but doesn't have the money. The ugly little secret of libertarianism is that it would be heaven for the 1%, a living hell for everyone else. I have been told with a straight face that a relative that is under 50 and requires a $100K a year medication to have a quality of life worth living should be put down like a dog because 'If he or his relatives can't pay for it why should I?" and that is libertarianism in a nutshell..pure GREED and ZERO empathy for the suffering of those not given a golden spoon by accident of birth like Romney or who luck into being in the right place at the right time like Gates.
What we NEED is a third party, talking with folks frankly most are right on foreign policy but VERY left when it comes to helping the weak among their fellow Americans, but our supposed "left wing party" is frankly right wing, its just our right wing has gone so far right it makes Attila the Hun look like a socialist by comparison. the nuts took over the nuthouse, that's why you don't see fiscal conservatives anymore, its all batshit loonies.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.